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31 At that time, says the Lord, I will be
the God of all the families of Israel, and they shall be my people.2 Thus says the Lord:
The people who survived the sword
found grace in the wilderness;
when Israel sought for rest,3 the Lord appeared to
him from far away.
I have loved you with an everlasting love;
therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.4 Again I will build you, and you shall be built,
O virgin Israel!
Again you shall take your tambourines,
and go forth in the dance of the merrymakers.5 Again you shall plant vineyards
on the mountains of Samaria;
the planters shall plant,
and shall enjoy the fruit.6 For there shall be a day when sentinels will call
in the hill country of Ephraim:
“Come, let us go up to Zion,
to the Lord our God.”

********

We who
have been on a Lenten journey have reached out Easter destination. Lent is,
after all, a season of preparation, much like Advent. It is not a journey into
infinity and beyond. There is an intended destination. If this isn’t the first
time we’ve taken the journey, then we know how the story unfolds. We know that
before we enjoy the glories of Easter, we must go through Good Friday. There is
no Easter without the cross. The message of Easter is that death does not have
the last word, especially when it comes to Jesus. Therefore, we can rejoice and even dance
before God’s throne. The question is—does this message resonate with the world
in which we live? Is it ready to welcome the message of Easter?

During the season of Easter, the
lectionary offers readings from the Book of Acts in place of the Old Testament
readings. While these readings from Acts are important, there is also the need
to continually attend to the voice of the Old Testament, for it was the Bible
of the Early Church, and we cannot understand the New Testament or the ministry
of Jesus without consulting it. There is an alternative reading for the day from
the Old Testament—Jeremiah 31:1-6. As you read Jeremiah 31, you may wonder
about its connection to the Gospel readings or to Easter. At first glance, how
does this reading enlighten us as to the promise of resurrection? The
connections seem tenuous at best, but if we dive deeper perhaps we’ll find that
connection.

The word of God, as delivered by
Jeremiah, speaks to the concerns of a people living in exile. Jeremiah has
witnessed the destruction of city of Jerusalem and the carting off of many of
its citizens to a foreign land. He had been among those taken. Jeremiah was
known to speak words of judgment on this people, but he also offered words of
consolation and hope. In this reading, we find words of hope expressed.
Jeremiah reminds the people of the wilderness, and how God had rescued the
people from danger, including from the sword. This was an act of grace, an act
that offers hope in a new situation that has the mark of a wilderness
wandering. The first group of wanderers hoped they would gain entrance to the
Promised Land. This group of wanderers hoped they could return to the Promised
Land. Perhaps this is the hope Jeremiah offers to us this Easter season. We can
take confidence in God’s grace, love, and faithfulness, that God will bring us
into the Promised Land. While Good
Friday may have ushered in a state of exile, it was not the last word. It is
true that at his death, Jesus’ followers wondered what the future held. In his
resurrection the vision of God became clearer to them.

At the core of Jeremiah’s message
is the promise that God would restore the people of Israel. God would bring the
nation back together. This promise may have been multifaceted, so that it might
bring the exiles back home, but also reunite the two former kingdoms of Judah
and Israel, so that God might once again be the God of all the people of
Israel. This promise is rooted in the additional promise that God is faithful
and loving! Is this not a word to he heard by us on Easter morning? Is there
not a new day for Israel and for all the people of God? There might not be a clear resurrection theme present
in this reading, but it does offer the promise of a new day and new life, even
as virgin Israel will be built by God.

When Mary Magdalene went to the
Tomb that first Easter morning, she entered her own wilderness experience. She
had placed great hope in the Teacher, but now he was gone. All she could do was
go to the tomb and grieve. When Simon Peter and the Beloved Disciple followed
her to the Tomb, after she reported it empty, they didn’t seem to have
resurrection in mind as a possible explanation for the missing body. They didn’t fully understand what had
happened, because this was not a normal experience. Only time and appearances by Jesus would
change their focus (John 20:1-18). For the Exiles living in the shadow of
Babylon, the prospects of returning home to Israel, so that they could plant
vineyards and enjoy its fruit seemed outlandish, and yet this is the hope that
Jeremiah held out for them. God will be the God of all the peoples of Israel.
That is the promise held out before the people, and in time Jeremiah’s word
will come true. The exile will end and the people will once again plant
vineyards in the land.

What
word then do we hold out before the world as followers of the Risen Christ?
What promise do we offer? Could it be that despite all that we see around us—the
war in Syria, the bombings of churches in Egypt, terrorist attacks in Europe,
the constant presence of bigotry and racism in our land, homelessness in our
cities—we can still find a word of hope in the story of Israel and its
deliverance from exile? Could it be that through Christ’s resurrection we become
heirs of that same promise?

Jeremiah
declares God’s everlasting love and faithfulness, and does so even in the midst
of seeming despair. Is this a promise we can take hold of? If we do, what will
this mean for us? Can we dance before
God, celebrating the new life we experience in Christ? John Holbert writes of
Jeremiah’s Easter message:

Like
Jeremiah, we need to look squarely in the face of the world’s ugliness and
horror and hopelessness and shout, “Christ is risen!” because the God who
raised Jesus from the dead loves us with an everlasting love and will always,
always continue divine faithfulness to us. Perhaps a look at Jeremiah on Easter
Day is not so irrelevant for a Christian, after all. [Feastingon the Word, p. 357].

Therefore, let us go to up to Zion, and dance before God,
rejoicing in God’s everlasting love and faithfulness, which sustains us even in
our times in the wilderness/exile. As we do, let us sing together: “Christ the
Lord, is Risen Today!”

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I am a Disciples of Christ pastor, theologian, community activist, historian, teacher. I'm a graduate of Fuller Theological Seminary with a M.Div. and a Ph.D. in Historical Theology. I'm the author of a number of books including
Out of the Office: A Theology of Ministry (Energion, 2017), Marriage in Interesting Times (Energion, 2016), and Freedom in Covenant (Wipf and Stock, 2015).